Justin Call's Blog: Stormcaller - Posts Tagged "master-artificer"

DRAFTING BOOK 2

Since the UK release of my debut in February, I've been spending all my time drafting the second book in the The Silent Gods series, tentatively titled Master Artificer. I'm happy to say that I've just passed the halfway point of that draft, and that merits a blog post.

While I can't tell you much about what I've been writing (no spoilers here), I can tell you a bit about its length . . . which is big. In fact, when I outlined Book 2, I estimated it to be approximately the same length as Book 1 (about 600 pages), but it seems I've underestimated my outline by a wide margin. Granted, I had expected to outpace my estimates by a few hundred words during the first draft (that's normal and can be edited out later). In fact, I guessed the first draft to be around 750-800 words and that the draft would then need to be pared down to 600-700 words (around 10-20%), which is just fine by me. Instead, my projections for finishing my book outline (based on what I've drafted so far) suggest I'll end up with a first draft of approximately 1291 pages.



That's a lot of pages.

So that leaves me in a bit of a quandary. I've mentioned the issue to a few friends and family and the more ignorant (and well-meaning) folks have suggested that I simply split the novel and publish it as two separate books. A tidy solution . . . and completely implausible, not only because that decision doesn't lie with me (it lies with the various publishers), but also because the story arcs would be too short and unsatisfying if I broke the book into smaller pieces.

That leaves me with three alternate solutions: (a) leave it as is and publish a Brandon Sanderson-sized novel, (b) edit and revise the book until it's a more manageable size, or (c) shorten the book by moving certain events from Book 2 to Book 3.

I don't have the street cred to publish a novel that large, nor would I want to do so (pacing would be a nightmare), so that eliminates Option A.

Assuming my editors and I can bring the word count down by a full 20%, that still leaves a book of approximately 1032 pages, which is still far too large for Book 2. If we're being mercenary with our edits, we might get it down to 903 pages . . . but that's still 50% bigger than the first book. A boon for readers who love big fantasy novels (that's me, if you haven't guessed it), but a bust for those readers who prefer slimmer, faster-paced stories. So we'll leave Option B as a maybe.

The final option would require moving a large portion of Book 2 into Book 3, but that's not solving the problem (only delaying its resolution until the next book); it also runs the risk of making Book 2 less satisfying, though I think I can probably work around that since I've got a solid outline for the second novel and I know where to break it apart if we chose to go that route. It's not my preference, though, since I'm quite happy with my current outline (it's just taking a little longer than I'd like to get my story told). So we can table Option C, too.

The advantage of this third option is also that I would finish the draft of Book 2 quicker, which means the book may actually be ready to be released next spring, as is currently scheduled. If I go ahead and write the whole book, though (and then go back and edit things down to a more reasonable size), I'm not likely to meet that deadline, which never a fun thing in the publishing world.

So those are the realities I'm struggling with at the moment. Lots of writing is getting done, but I'm discovering that I'm not a very efficient writer when it comes to outlining chapters and then writing those chapters within a reasonable length of pages. Hopefully I'll get better as I go along (keeping a good pace is very important to me), but I also don't want to cut good scenes just to meet an arbitrary page-count (did I mention that I like big books?).

FOREIGN EDITIONS AND THE U.S. EDITION

In other news, the German edition of Master of Sorrows was released this past March (titled Sohn der Sieben) and has been getting pretty solid reviews on Goodreads, Audible and Amazon (we are averaging about 4.1–4.5 stars in all locations and languages). If haven't rated the book yet (and especially if you read it and enjoyed it), please share those ratings and reviews with places mentioned above as it really does help to market the book better and increase sales, which assures that I'll be able to write more books in the future. Even if you didn't enjoy the book, articulating why you didn't like something can still be helpful for readers (because what doesn't work for you may be just the thing that gets another reader excited).

Foreign publishing deals for Master of Sorrows have also been made in France, the Netherlands, and (most recently) Russia, so we should expect to see the book series hit those markets in the next year or so (once translations have been done).

Back here in the states, Blackstone Publishing secured the rights to The Silent Gods and have recently communicated that they would like to release Master of Sorrows in the US in February of 2020, approximately one year after its release date in the UK. That may seem strange (and it is a bit), but I'll briefly explain their logic. If the book were released in the US this fall (as we had originally planned), then it's likely to get drowned out by all the new big books being sold and published in preparation for Black Friday and Christmas sales. That's fine if you're an established author with a big fan base, but as a debut author who is relatively unknown, it's not the wisest thing, so we all decided it would be better to release the first book next year in the spring. The advantage of this is that it also gives Blackstone lots of time to market and advertise the book (something we didn't get to do very much of when it was released in the UK earlier this year).

AUTHOR EVENTS

I'll be attending several author events this year, including Gollancz Fest in London and WorldCon in Dublin. Both of those will happen in the first half of August, so if you live in the UK and want your copy of Master of Sorrows signed, please stay tuned for future book signings at or near those venues (and, of course, you can find me at the conventions themselves).

In addition to traveling to the UK, I'll be attending FanX in Salt Lake City, Utah this coming September, plus the PNBA (Pacific-Northwest Booksellers Association) Tradeshow in Portland, OR this October. Both of these events will be in advance of my book being released in the US, though, so don't expect any book sales to be had (though Blackstone should have some earlier US editions available for indie bookstore owners who want to read the book before it's officially released). If you'd like me to sign any edition of MoS (UK or otherwise), then by all means please follow me on Twitter and find me at one of these events.

In addition to these larger events, I should be doing some signings near my hometown of Park City, UT next spring. Foremost on my list of indie bookstores are Weller Book Works and The King's English in Salt Lake City, plus Dolly's Bookstore in downtown Park City. Stay tuned!

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